


Four Months (Part of the 'First Snow' collection)

by x_art



Category: Thunderheart (1992)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-22
Updated: 2014-11-22
Packaged: 2018-02-26 13:32:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,836
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2653811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/x_art/pseuds/x_art
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>His first winter on the res.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Four Months (Part of the 'First Snow' collection)

August

 

“Damnit, Ray.”

“I got it!”

“I mean it!”

“I’m know,” Ray growled as he dodged a prairie dog hole and then another. The terrain wasn’t as even as it had looked from the highway—it was covered with dips and drops and holes of every size. At this rate he was gonna break his leg or shoot his own foot and his anger notched higher and he muttered again, “I know.”

“Well if you _know,”_ Crow Horse answered, “why didn’t you do something when you had the chance?”

“Fuck you, Walter _,_ ” he growled.

“You wish,” Crow Horse answered, a smile in his voice. “Hey, wait up.” Crow Horse stopped running, pausing in the shade of a pine, about fifty feet from their destination.

Ray stopped, too.

With a deep breath, Crow Horse rested his .22 on his shoulder and tipped his head towards the pale blue sky. _“Kenny!_ ” he shouted. “There’s nowhere to go, man!”

“That’s what you think!” came a voice from above, faint and more than a little hysterical. “I can hide out in these hills a long time!”

“What hills?” Crow Horse muttered to Ray, jerking his thumb at the high plains that surrounded them, at the lone outcrop of limestone in front of them.

The butte was maybe three hundred feet in circumference and less than seventy feet high—it rose from the prairie floor like a beat up, stubby thumb. The rest of the land was flat as a board, covered with rabbitbrush and the occasional scrub pines.

“We know about the vehicle you stashed on the service road!” Crow Horse added, still shouting at the sky. “By now, the Wyoming staties have impounded it!”

There was a pause, then Kenny called out, “It don’t matter. They can have it! Besides, what do you care? This ain’t your jurisdiction!”

Crow Horse shook his head. “I care because you _committed a crime_ in my jurisdiction! You can drop dead and I’ll still come for you. You know that!”

“I know shit— Wait! I mean _you_ know shit!”

Crow Horse grinned, shooting a sunny smile Ray’s way.

Ray sighed. Crow Horse was actually enjoying this, chasing Kenny Red Bear across miles of nothing into Wyoming. He was having fun. Ray wasn’t having fun. He was tired, hot and sweating, even though the wind that blew his hair into his eyes was cool, almost chilly.

And he was angry because Crow Horse had been right—if he’d been paying attention, Kenny would never have given them the slip while he was meeting his contact for that one last shipment of marijuana. He’d looked over at the wrong moment, spied Ray and then taken off in his Chevy, heading west, Ray and Crow Horse trailing after in the truck.

They almost caught Kenny in Hot Springs but again, Ray’s distraction cost them—he’d glanced away at the wrong moment and Kenny had slipped through their fingers. It should never have gone down that way and Ray wanted to snarl or shoot something. He’d never made so many mistakes, even during his first days with the Bureau.

Crow Horse tried again, “C’mon, Kenny!”

“I’m not going back!” Kenny shouted in return.

Crow Horse waved his rifle. “I’ve got a .22 that says you are.”

“Crow Horse,” Ray muttered.

“I _can’t_ , man!” Kenny said. “My old lady is gonna kick me out if I end up in jail again!”

Crow Horse snorted. “So your problem is that your mom is going to kick you out of her home, not that we have your maryjane and you lost all that money?”

“Well, yeah! You know my mom, man! She’s scary!”

Crow Horse chuckled and opened his mouth to respond. Before he could, Ray interrupted with a hissed, _“Walter!”_

Crow Horse glanced at him. “Yeah?”

He gestured impatiently to the right.

“Yeah,” Crow Horse murmured. “Okay.”

They took off, walking quickly, Ray to the left, Crow Horse to the right.

It turned out that the butte was steep on one side but accessible on the other and Ray climbed the slope easily. A few sad looking pines dotted the flat crown at the top and he took cover behind one, peering around it.

The eastern edge of the butte was a natural barricade; greyish limestone boulders lay in loose piles, forming a shoulder-high lip. Kenny was crouched behind one of the boulders, still facing east, back turned to Ray.

Ray shook his head, waited for Crow Horse to join him, then pointed.

Crow Horse nodded and as one, they crept across the hard surface of the butte’s top until they were maybe ten feet away from their fugitive.

“Kenny?” Crow Horse said conversationally.

Kenny jumped with a startled cry, twisting around so quickly he tripped and fell sideways. “Hey, man, you scared me!”

“Sorry about that,” Crow Horse said, sarcasm in every syllable.

Kenny righted himself. “You should be!”

Kenny was half-white, almost eighteen, a man by Res standards. He looked more like a kid—short, scrawny with a scattering of acne along his jaw. He was wearing a faded yellow t-shirt that said _‘Keep on Truckin’’_ and a pair of ratty jeans and rattier sneakers. He wasn’t armed which was a good thing because he was stoned out of his mind.

Ray had seen him around town, mostly in the presence of another juvenile delinquent who was probably the instigator of the pair. Kenny, from what he’d seen, wasn’t very bright.

Crow Horse gestured with the rifle. “Kenny, c’mon out of there. You’re sitting on a cactus.”

Ray holstered his weapon. “Not to mention that those boulders are a perfect home for rattlesnakes.”

Kenny shot up again and looked wildly around, searching for the non-existent snake.

Crow Horse snorted, then gestured again. “You know the drill—turn around.”

Kenny hesitated like he was going to give it one last try. And then he sighed, straightened up and turned, hands behind his back.

Crow Horse gave Ray the rifle, went over and cuffed Kenny, then took his arm. “C’mon, kid. I’ll give you a break—I won’t tell your mom until tomorrow.” He led Kenny towards the path.

Kenny looked around hopefully. “You won’t?”

Crow Horse nodded. “You can stay the night in the jail. I’ll go see her in the morning.”

“Thanks, man.”

Ray wanted to say, _‘What’s the difference between telling her now and tomorrow?’_ but kept quiet. He didn’t know Linda Red Bear. For all he knew, waiting fifteen hours _would_ make a difference. He took Kenny’s other arm and together, he and Crow Horse helped him down the slope.

They got to the base of the outcrop and were circling around when Kenny jerked his head towards Ray, “Hey, Walter—this is the guy, right?”

“What guyis that, Kenny,” Ray answered before Crow Horse could.

“You know,” Kenny said, still speaking to Crow Horse as if Ray were invisible. “The _guy._ The half-breed Fed that got Milton?”

“Naw,” Crow Horse answered, shaking his head. “That was some other half-breed Fed.”

“Oh,” Kenny said thoughtfully, again missing the sarcasm in Crow Horse’s voice. “I thought he was the guy.”

Ray wanted to slug Kenny to prove that he wasn’t invisible, that he was right _there,_ a couple inches away, but why bother? The rest of the tribe treated him the same way, as if he didn’t exist. All except Grandpa Reaches and Maggie’s grandma. And Crow Horse, of course.

The few times they’d talked about it, Crow Horse had said the tribe had been burned by the white man too many times and trust had to be earned. That Ray should give them time and that it was important to be patient.

He’d always answered that he understood, that he would. But, a not-so-tiny part of him was growing sour and resentful. Crow Horse had accepted him. Maggie had accepted him. Why not the rest?

A jay landed on a nearby pine, startling him. It hopped from one branch to another, then squawked at Ray, as if mocking his frustration with its sharp, bright cry.

*

It took the better part of the day to get Kenny back to the res. Luckily, the Wyoming State Police hadn’t tagged Linda Red Bear’s truck and they decided to drive it back so Linda wouldn’t have to. Crow Horse wanted to take the truck, joking that Ray wasn’t familiar with sticky clutches, what with all the fancy vehicles he was used to.

Ray gave Crow Horse a look that told him what he thought of that idea and said he’d be fine. When Crow Horse opened his mouth to argue, Ray told him that if he had to drive with Kenny and all his complaining, he’d kill him before they made it to the state line.

Kenny twitched with fear and looked pleadingly at Crow Horse, already muttering about the _‘FBI,’_ and _‘…it’s what they_ did, _man…”_

Crow Horse shook his head but Ray got his way.

He followed the Chevy, aware that Crow Horse and Kenny talked the whole way home, almost certainly about him.

 

***

 

September

 

“Damn, Ray,” Crow Horse muttered with a soft chuckle as he gently pressed the corner of Ray’s mouth with the alcohol-soaked cotton ball. “I thought you were gonna take his head off.”

Ray hissed at the sharp spike of pain. Down on the floor, next to the desk, Jimmy whined in sympathy. “He had it coming.”

“Jackson’s just bored. Now that Milton is gone, he’s got no purpose and you’re an easy target. He’ll settle down once he figures that out.”

He pulled away, leaning back so he could glare at Crow Horse. “I’m tired of waiting for him to figure it out. This is the third time he’s interfered with the performance of my duties.”

Crow Horse snorted. “I’d hardly call driving Miss Mills to the grocery store performing a…” He made air quotes. “ _‘…duty.’_ ” He squinted and dabbed Ray’s chin. “But, I know why you do it. That woman is gonna kill someone pretty soon.”

“Cite her for driving without a license. It will get her off the road and then she’ll _have_ to let me drive her.”

“She’d never forgive me.”

“Crow Horse—”

“Ray,” Crow Horse interrupted, raising his eyebrow. “Valerie’s family goes back to Columbus and she’s got her share of pride. The only way to help her out is if we make it _seem_ like we’re not helping her out.”

Before Ray could retort with a, _‘Fat lot of good that will do if she runs her truck off the side of the road again,’_ Crow Horse added, “It’s a damned if you do, damned if you don’t situation. Now hold still.” Crow Horse lightened the pressure. “Does that hurt?”

Crow Horse’s voice had grown soft, intimate, and Ray reminded himself that they were in the office, that Susie was at her desk, on the other side of the very thin wall.

And, that he couldn’t just lay back and tug Crow Horse onto him like he wanted because his blood was still up from the fight with Jackson and sex might calm him down. “No.” He pulled away and stood. “I’m fine.”

“Good.” Crow Horse threw the cotton ball in the trash and screwed the cap back on the alcohol. And then he looked at Ray, clearly wanting to say something and Ray waited for it, waited for the, _‘This is the third fight you’ve been in since you got here,’_ or _‘How can you keep the peace if you keep breaking it?’_

All he said was, “You get some work done and I’ll take Jackson to the clinic. Jimmy?”

Ray watched as Crow Horse and Jimmy left, then sat at his desk. He had a stack of paperwork to finish, including the incident report from the Kenny Red Bear arrest. It had been two weeks since he and Crow Horse had reunited Linda with her son and her truck and he still hadn’t had time to complete the report.

Promising himself that he wouldn’t move until he was finished, he turned on the radio and picked up his pen.

*

It was dark by the time he got home. He parked between the ancient Bear Creek Reservation Ford and the rusty green truck that Crow Horse insisted they keep because it wasn’t _that_ busted and he was going to fix it as soon as he had time.

Ray didn’t know a lot about thirty-year old trucks but he knew enough—busted was busted and it would probably be better to junk the thing. If they could find some place to junk it, of course.

He grabbed the groceries and got out.

On his way to the house, he passed the motorcycle—the engine was still warm; Crow Horse had just arrived, too.

“Hey,” he called out as he crossed the threshold between dark and light. “How did it go?”

“You mean Jackson?” Crow Horse answered from the bathroom. “Peachy.”

“I take it he’s not happy?”

Crow Horse came out and leaned against the doorjamb, drying his hands on a towel. “He wanted to press charges. I, of course, laughed and told him that being an ex-GOON entitled him to exactly squat.”

Ray sat the groceries down and took off his jacket. “The GOONs aren’t exactly disbanded. You think he’ll make trouble?”

“Do you care?”

He got out a saucepan. The only red sauce he could find at the tiny market was an off brand. He opened the jar and smelled it. It smelled like tomato and onion and not much else. “What do you think?”

Instead of answering, Crow Horse came up behind him and peered over his shoulder. “Spaghetti, again?”

“If you can call this spaghetti.” He held up the jar. “I’d kill for a decent Italian restaurant.” He poured the sauce into the pan and turned on the gas. It hissed and popped and sprung to life, the flame enveloping the sides of the pan. He turned the gas down.

Crow Horse put his arm around Ray’s waist. “How ’bout we take a mini vacation? We’ll go to Rapid City and spend the night.”

Ray looked over his shoulder. “Can we do that?”

Crow Horse shrugged. “We’ll tell Suzie and Floyd; they’ll be okay for a few days.”

“When can we go?”

“In a couple weeks? After the next Inipi ceremony?”

“Yeah,” Ray nodded slowly. “I’d like that.”

“Good.” Crow Horse gave him a quick hug, then returned to the bathroom.  “I need to run over to Grandpa’s. His genny is on the fritz again.”

“I’ll save you some dinner.”

“Okay.”

He grinned at Crow Horse’s less-than-eager tone. Yeah, he wasn’t a great cook, but he wasn’t _that_ bad and when it came down to it, Crow Horse wasn’t a picky eater. Besides, spaghetti was better than the endless macaroni and cheese that Crow Horse preferred.

He stirred the sauce, absentmindedly closing the window above the sink against the chilly breeze.

*

After dinner he tried to get some writing done but couldn’t concentrate. He’d type, then white out what he’d just written. At nine, he gave up and went to bed.

 

***

 

October

 

“Ray.” And then, “Damnit, _Ray—”_ Crow Horse hissed when Ray took off his hat so he could get to him better, so he could kiss him better.

He dropped the hat  on the floor and scooted back on the table. Crow Horse followed, edging onto the table, pushing him down to lay on him.

“This better hold,” Crow Horse muttered, his mouth warm on Ray’s throat.

“It’s your table.”

“So it’s my fault if it breaks?”

“What do you think?”

“I think I want you.”

He smiled vaguely and relaxed, his elbow hitting the small tower of mail his mother had just forwarded. The pile slid and spilled onto the floor. And that was okay. He didn’t want to think about his mom right now or her constant worry that he was having _issues_ —her polite term for a mental breakdown—and that he needed to come back to DC. He didn’t want to think about the letter from his non-ex-girlfriend, Jessie, that his mother had so thoughtfully included in the last package.

He didn’t want to think about anything except the way Crow Horse’s skin was slippery with sweat and how good it felt to be here, alone, in the house with the doors locked.

“Ray?” Crow Horse muttered.

He slid his hand under Crow Horse’s vest. “Hm?”

“I don’t care if my table breaks, but I care if I break you in the process.”

Ray sighed, then pushed Crow Horse back. He stood up. “Yeah. Okay.”

Crow Horse winked. “You’ll thank me later.”

He tried not to smile. “That’s what you say now.”

*

He stroked Crow Horse’s arm from bicep to wrist. Crow Horse made a noise, a soft rumble like a cat and tightened his arm around Ray’s chest.

The wind had picked up. Ray could hear it, could feel its strength. It battered the house like a fist as if looking for weak spots in the siding, searching for holes and gaps. No luck there. The house, begun when he’d first arrived on the res but unfinished thanks to the growing amount of police work, was solid and well built. It would hold up to the coming winter.

He shivered, not meaning to.

“What?” Crow Horse asked, his eyes still closed.

“Nothing.”

“Hmm.”

He knew that tone. “Seriously. It’s nothing.”

Crow Horse didn’t say anything for a moment and then he whispered, “Did you have the dream again?”

Ray shook his head, his chin stroking Crow Horse’s hair. “No.”

“Sure?”

“Yeah.” He hadn’t had the dream in months; he wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or bad thing.

“Well, you’ll let me know if you have it again, right?”

Whenever Crow Horse asked after the Maggie dream, he always added, _‘You’ll let me know, right?’_ As if Ray kept things from him on purpose. As if Ray could ever hide anything from him, to begin with. “Hey?” he said softly.

Without a word, Crow Horse slipped off and turned on his side. “Don’t stay up too long. I know you want to work but I gotta meet with Fred and the council tomorrow at nine in the a.m.”

“I remember.”

Crow Horse hesitated, then rolled to his back. “You could come. To the council meeting.”

He picked up his shorts and pulled them on.

“They’ve asked how you’re doing. Why don’t you tell them in person.”

“They’re afraid of me.” Next, he stepped into a pair of jeans and pulled on the faded Quantico sweatshirt that he only wore at home.

“They’re not afraid of you, they just don’t—”

“‘… _trust me,_ ’” Ray interrupted, sitting down on the bed to lace up his boots. “It’s the same thing, isn’t it?”

Crow Horse hesitated, then said quietly, “Whether they like it or not, whether _you_ like it or not, you belong here, Ray.”

“I know.” He got up and pulled the bedcovers up to Crow Horse’s shoulders, even though they wouldn’t stay there for long. Crow Horse slept warm; Ray was always waking to a smothering a pile of sheets and blankets and quilts that Crow Horse had heedlessly shoved onto him while asleep. “I know,” he repeated with a touch on Crow Horse’s quilt-covered knee.

Followed by Jimmy, he went to what passed for the living room.

The house wasn’t fancy. A big main room, a kitchen, one bathroom and one bedroom. There was a storage shed in the back where Ray kept his tools, but that was it.

They’d chosen a small parcel of land halfway between town and Grandpa Reaches. It had access to the county power grid and bordered Running Deer Creek. Crow Horse had pushed for the move, saying that the property had been his family’s ancestral land even though he’d never felt the need to claim it. It had, he’d said, a clean water source and a wide stand of cottonwoods that would provide shade for the new house in the summer.

And, he’d added bluntly, that it was some distance from town. He didn’t care what anyone thought, but there was no sense in giving them reason to talk.

It hadn’t bothered Ray, Crow Horse’s justifications—he hadn’t wanted to live in town, anyway.

It was too late for coffee, but he poured a cup from the ancient metal pot anyway. He started to sit down at the kitchen table and the waiting typewriter, but something made him pause. He went to the door, unlocked it, and stepped outside.

Like the interior of the house, the exterior was plain—a covered porch with a few steps that led to the front yard. He still needed to finish some of the details. Like that last sand and seal of the planks, and he tread lightly as he crossed the cold, rough pine to sit on the steps.

So, yes, they’d chosen this plot of land for convenience but it had one thing that he’d loved almost immediately and he looked around.

The days were growing shorter, each day measurably less than the day before. Even this early in the evening, he shouldn’t be able to see much beyond the two cottonwoods that grew by the dirt driveway. But the moon was almost full, a sideways tipping oval surrounded by a double ring that glowed blue. It cast a strong light, revealing the trees that lined the river, the water that moved slowly north, the crooked outline that made up the southern-most point of the Badlands. It was beautiful, the view. Beautiful and lonely and Ray wondered how he was going to stand it, the approaching cold.

His first winter on the res.

Sometimes the thought filled him with dread, most times it filled him with a kind of manic glee. As if the coming isolation was a physical thing, exhilarating and challenging but always a little frightening. He wasn’t fond of winter. In the past, he’d jet off to someplace warm if the slush and ice got to be too much. Hawaii, Mexico, and once to Bermuda with Monica from the typing pool.

He sighed—those days seemed so long ago, like they’d happened to a completely different man.

“Hey.”

He turned around. Crow Horse was standing in the doorway, naked except for a pair of jeans and a striped blanket wrapped around his shoulders. “I thought you were asleep.” Crow Horse wasn’t a night owl—by nine, he was generally in bed or ready for it.

“Couldn’t.” Crow Horse stepped onto the porch, wincing a little. “It’s cold. It’s gonna snow soon.”

Ray turned back around and stared out at the dark yard. “Yeah.”

“Ray—” Crow Horse came up close behind. “Move forward a bit.”

Ray scooted and Crow Horse sat down behind him, legs on either side of his own. “You’ll freeze,” he said even though the heat of Crow Horse’s was like a small sun.

Crow Horse huddled close and wrapped the blanket around Ray, drawing him in. “It’s not that bad. Wait until February.”

He nodded and finished the last of his coffee.

Crow Horse sighed. “Ray?”

“Yeah?” The blanket smelled of damp wool.

“Do you know why you’ve been so ansty lately?”

He cracked a smile. “No, Walter, why have I been so antsy lately?”

“Smartass,” Crow Horse nuzzled the nape of Ray’s neck. “It’s because the seasons are changing and you’re getting anxious.”

He frowned. “I am?”

“Yeah. All animals feel it. Horses get restless and jumpy, rabbits and prairie dogs eat like it’s going out of style, hawks take crazy chances and go after animals they couldn’t possibly catch.”

“I’m not a hawk.”

“No, but you’re part of this earth. You feel the same things every animal feels. It’s your spirit’s way of getting your body ready for winter.”

He hesitated, thinking about it. When he’d been undercover, so deep he could barely remember his own name, he’d sometimes feel something of what Crow Horse was describing. A momentary, sub-surface apprehension that seemed almost innate, as if his body was telling his mind to watch out when there was no logical or obvious motivation for the alarm.

He sighed and leaned back into Crow Horse. “You’re pretty smart, you know that?”

Crow Horse tightened his arms. “Not me,” he said, a smile in his voice. “My grandma had a bunch of barn cats. Every time it got to be spring or fall, they’d go crazy, running around the fields and the house like their tails were on fire. She told me it was because they knew a change was coming and their blood was up.”

“I wish I could have known her,” he murmured. Crow Horse talked about his grandparents a lot, but mostly about his grandmother.

“She would have been suspicious of you at first. But then she would have come around.”

“Business as usual,” he murmured, resigned but not angry.

“No, not that. She was always suspicious of the people in my life. My friends, my girlfriends.”

Ray twisted around. “What girlfriends?”

Crow Horse raised one eyebrow. “Oh, I got around, Levoi. My grandma always said I was the perfect Indian except I had a fatal flaw.”

Ray frowned. “What fatal flaw?”

“My weakness for blonds.”

It took Ray a moment, still caught on a stinging thread of jealousy. And then he laughed out loud and twisted fully, wrestling Crow Horse to the ground, still laughing as Crow Horse gave him kiss after kiss.

 

***

 

November

 

“Damnit, Ray!”

“What is it?” he muttered, not looking up from the typewriter. He’d gotten pretty far, the night before last. He’d edited the outline and finished the first two chapters. Not bad, considering he wasn’t a real writer. If he kept up the pace, he’d have the first draft ready for the editor by February like he’d promised.

“You said you were gonna fix this door.”

“I did.”

“Does it _look_ fixed?”

He looked up. Crow Horse was in the doorway with an armful of wood. His plaid jacket had caught on the protruding nail head that Ray had said he’d fix the day before. “Oops,” he said, trying not to smile.

Any other person would have gotten angry or at the very least, pissed off. Any other person wasn’t Crow Horse and Ray could see the second his irritation faded to plain annoyance.

“Sorry,” he said as contritely as possible.

“Just fix the door.”

“Will do.” A faint cloud of steam had begun to drift from Crow Horse’s body, the reaction of heat and cold.

Crow Horse tossed the firewood into the box. “It’s gonna be a doozy.” He brushed off his hands. “I’m gonna finish the rest before it really picks up.”

“I can help you.”

“Nah, I got it. No sense in both of us freezing.”

“I’ll make some coffee.”

 “Thanks.”

Crow Horse turned to go but Ray stopped him with a soft, “Walter?”

The sun was almost down and it cast thin bands of orange-gold light through the trees, across the porch and across Crow Horse. It mixed with the vapor, haloing Crow Horse in an eerie glow, giving him an almost unearthly appearance. Like he’d stepped across a mystical threshold from the _then_ to the _now_.

“Yeah?”

“You have a council meeting next week, right?”

Crow Horse cocked his head and said slowly, “Yeah. We’re gonna discuss the feasibility of building a new wing on the school.”

Ray shook off his odd daze and looked straight into Crow Horse’s eyes. “I’d like to come.”

His words weren’t of undying love or anything like it, but Crow Horse’s expression warmed as if they were. He nodded, smiled, and then left, shutting the door gently behind him.

Ray watched him for a moment, then glanced at the letter he always had within arm’s reach when he worked. It was a single paragraph note from a publisher in New York, expressing interest in Maggie’s story, provided Ray could get him at least four chapters by the end of February.

When he’d showed the letter to Crow Horse, he’d whooped and told Ray to hold onto it. It was a talisman, he’d said, something they could both use to keep their spirits up, to stay focused. It had been on the tip of Ray’s tongue to ask why Crow Horse would need either when he’d remembered, _“My family has been involved since Columbus landed.”_

Crow Horse’s family was as old as Maggie’s. That kind of living legacy brought its own pride as well as its own burden. If Ray could help, even just to be there as a silent partner at tribal events or as a chronicler of recent events, well, he’d do it.

He hesitated, fingers poised over the keyboard, thinking on that day and the celebratory night after. And then he smiled, cleared his throat, and began to type:

_The first time I met Maggie Eagle Bear, she hated me on sight…_

 

 

_fin._

**Author's Note:**

> This story is a continuation of my 'To the End of the Earth' story.


End file.
